The increasing availability of hardware to create multimedia works has generated a corresponding increase in the desire of consumers to view the resulting works and share those works with friends. Especially in the case of novice users, this has meant a foray into new areas of technology with corresponding exposure to the sometimes difficult process of creating multimedia works such as, for example, computerized music or video works.
The increasing availability of multimedia digital editing software and hardware has brought new users into this field. These multimedia works are usually created in digital editing applications that have been specifically designed for that purpose and which have established a more-or-less standard approach to the editing of digital source materials. The editing process, whether it is applied to audio or video materials, usually requires the use of high-performance computer hardware. However most users eventually discover that, no matter how powerful their hardware might be, they will eventually overtax the capabilities of their system.
One familiar symptom of system overload is the appearance of “lags” in the audio portion of the work. By “lag” is meant the stutters, skips, dropouts, slowdowns etc. (collectively “performance anomaly”, hereinafter), that are observed during audio/video playback when the demands on the CPU exceed its ability to respond. For a typical PC user this is an obvious annoyance that may be difficult to eliminate. That is, it is often difficult for a novice user to figure out exactly where the source of the problem lies. However in a professional environment, such as a recording studio or in music or film production environments where the work must be accomplished according to fixed deadlines, a problem such as this can be disastrous for the whole production process.
Of course, lags are almost inevitable in the production of a multimedia work of any complexity. The most common approach to helping the user solve this problem is to provide a system-wide CPU load meter, wherein the current CPU load for the entire computer and/or the current song is displayed in real time. This sort of display informs the user about the general instantaneous CPU load of the entire application. However, it should be clear that this sort of display is not particularly informative when the goal is to determine which of a multiplicity of tracks might be the root cause of the CPU overload.
That is, in some cases, the performance lag is caused by a single track (or by a few tracks). Of course, if it were known which were the problem, eliminating or modifying these track(s) would likely eliminate the lag. However, in today's digital multitrack environment it may be difficult to pinpoint the offending track or tracks if the only information available to the user is that the playback lags at a certain point in time. PC-based digital mixers with twenty-four (or more) tracks are readily available, which makes the task of identifying the lag source problematic and that is especially so, if the only information that is available to a user is the time-location of an anomaly. Further, whether the slow-down is caused by difficulties in sounding or reproducing a single track—or a combination of tracks—is usually not apparent.
A typical approach to solving this problem would be to selectively mute or stop various of the tracks (first one at a time, two at a time, etc.) and note when the problem is eliminated. However such a process is quite tedious and often requires considerable time to come to an acceptable result. Of course, and for those users who are working in the professional sector of audio and video industry, such a process of the time spent in finding and solving such lags ultimately costs the user money, and this is especially so when he or she is not able to finish a product within an allotted deadline.
Thus, what is needed is a system and method that would allow a user to quickly determine which tracks are responsible for causing specific time anomalies in a multitrack work. The method would allow the user to identify specific load connected problems of the corresponding application and therewith would increase the efficiency and work flow of the user.
Accordingly, it should now be recognized, as was recognized by the present inventors, that there exists, and has existed for some time, a very real need for a system and a method that would address and solve the above-described problems.
Before proceeding to a description of the present invention, however, it should be noted and remembered that the description of the invention which follows, together with the accompanying drawings, should not be construed as limiting the invention to the examples (or preferred embodiments) shown and described. This is so because those skilled in the art to which the invention pertains will be able to devise other forms of the invention within the ambit of the appended claims.